All previews: click here for the full 2019 NCAA tournament schedule
Virginia Cavaliers
Seed: 1
Record: 33-3
Conference: ACC
vs.
Auburn Tigers
Seed: 5
Record: 30-9
Conference: SEC
Date: Saturday, April 6
Time: 6:09 pm Eastern
Location: Minneapolis, MN
Channel: CBS
Virginia is the last remaining 1-seed following losses by Gonzaga and Duke. Of course, 5-seed Auburn took care of the other one, North Carolina.
Virginia Auburn
Power Ratings
Strength: #4 Strength: #11
Pomeroy: #1 Pomeroy: #11
Offense: #2 Offense: #6
Defense: #5 Defense: #38
BPI: #1 BPI: #12
LRMC: #4* LRMC: #10*
*from Selection Sunday
Other Measures:
Tempo (Pomeroy): #353 (352/345) Tempo: #153 (70/334)
Consistency: #71 Consistency: #303
2nd half season: #2 2nd half season: #11
Last 4 games: #11 Last 4 games: #4
Virginia has fallen to #4 in Strength, passed by Michigan State after the Spartans' win over Duke and the Cavaliers' needing overtime to beat Purdue. But they remain #1 in Pomeroy and have regained the #1 spot in the BPI (Gonzaga fell to #2 for losing to Texas Tech). Regardless of where you put them exactly the Cavs are a tough team, top five in both offense and defense.
Auburn hasn't moved much despite their Final Four run; they were #12 or #13 in all the power ratings and now are #11 or #12 (the exception is the LRMC, which had them #10 before the tournament started).
Auburn's hope to run on offense will be tested by Virginia's defense, and the overall game will be slowed by the Cavaliers' offense. Virginia's consistency is one thing that got them here, while Auburn has been erratic—but in the last month or so they were pretty tried and true, then they've been inconsistent primarily on the upside. They've played at a higher level than Virginia, who ranks worst among the remaining teams in tournament play.
Season overview: Virginia
- Wins vs. tournament teams (14): =(5)Wisconsin+7, @(6)Maryland+5, (8)VCU+8, (4)Florida St.+13, (4)Virginia Tech+22, @(1)North Carolina+8, @(4)Virginia Tech+6, @(7)Louisville+12, @(8)Syracuse+26, (7)Louisville+5, =Gardner Webb+15, =(9)Oklahoma+12, =(12)Oregon+4, =(3)Purdue+OT
- Wins vs. Sweet Sixteen (6): (4)Florida St.+13, (4)Virginia Tech+22, @(1)North Carolina+8, @(4)Virginia Tech+6, =(12)Oregon+4, =(3)Purdue+OT
- Wins vs. Final Four (0): none
- Losses to tournament teams (3): @(1)Duke-2, (1)Duke-10, =(4)Florida St.-10
- Other losses (0): none
Overview: Virginia's 2019 season was pretty much like their 2018 season—lots of wins, and very few losses. They lost only 3 times. The first loss to Duke was a "good" loss, by 2 points on Duke's home court. The next time they lost at home by 10—which again wasn't bad considering Duke inexplicably shot the lights out from behind the arc. The third loss was the troubling one, loing to Florida State by 10 on a neutral court. It was their worst performance of the year. Afterwards there were some concerning locker room quotes about how they felt they got "punked." Hopefully that game allowed them to relive, and reject, the bad feelings from the UMBC loss. But even if it renews them in the short term, the fact that they faltered in the ACC tournament doesn't seem to bode well for their chances of winning the Big Dance. Has reaching the Final Four exorcised their demons?
On the upside, the season included wins over 10 tournament teams, including 1-seed North Carolina. They didn't really play a lot of top seeds outside of Duke. Sure, they can beat 4-seeds, but that only gets you to the Elite Eight. Does having a slightly weak SOS harm them? People ask the question about Gonzaga all the time, but Virginia's SOS was just borderline top 25 entering the tourney.
Virginia's offense is actually at least the equal of it's defense, believe it or not. That's one thing that should propel the team through the brackets. They're shooting the ball extremely well, especially three-pointers, and limiting turnovers. On defense they're basically the same as last year, making teams shoot poor percentage shots. Kyle Guy leads the team at 15.6 ppg, while De'Andre Hunter and Ty Jerome add 15.1 and 13.0 respectively. Hunter missed last year's game, and after watching from the bench I can only imagine he's ready to go.
Hunter certainly was ready to go, leading the team with 23 points against Gardner Webb. The game looked like deja vu until the 2nd half started and Virginia righted the ship, winning 71-56. Against Oklahoma the Cavaliers looked like their old selves, winning methodically 63-51 behind Mamadi Diakite's 14 points. Virginia outlasted a tough Oregon team, 53-49; Ty Jerome had 16. Down 2 to Purdue with seconds to go, Jerome intentionally missed a free throw, then Kihei Clark recovered the batted ball well across midcourt and zipped a pass to Diakite who calmly and precisely swished the tying bucket with time expiring. The Cavaliers won 80-75 in overtime with Guy's 25 leading the way.
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- Wins vs. tournament teams (11): (9)Washington+22, (12)Murray St.+5, (10)Florida+14, (5)Mississippi St.+5, (2)Tennessee+4, =(10)Florida+3, =(2)Tennessee+20, =(12)New Mexico St.+1, =(4)Kansas+14, =(2)North Carolina+17, =(2)Kentucky+OT
- Wins vs. Sweet Sixteen (4): (2)Tennessee+4, =(2)Tennessee+20, =(2)North Carolina+17, =(2)Kentucky+OT
- Wins vs. Final Four (0): none
- Losses to tournament teams (7): =(1)Duke-6, @(8)Mississippi-15, (2)Kentucky-2, @(5)Mississippi St.-8, @(3)LSU-5, (8)Mississippi-5, @(2)Kentucky-27
- Other losses (2): @North Carolina St.-7, @South Carolina-3
Overview: Auburn ended an up and down year with an 8-game winning streak punctuated by an emphatic 20-point win over Tennessee, the 2nd time in March that they beat the Volunteers. Those were the clear highlights of their 7 wins over tourney teams; they lost games vs. other highly seeded teams Duke, Kentucky (x2) and LSU; all of those teams reached the Sweet Sixteen.
Auburn's defense isn't on the level of its offense but they do a few things very well: block shots (#5) and get turnovers (#1 in nation, due to #1 ranking in steals). On offense Auburn shoots a lot of threes, and they're good enough at it to compensate for getting their shots blocked a lot and not getting to the line all that often. They also rebound pretty well. Three Tigers average in double figures led by Bryce Brown's 15.8. While last year's team had a very short roster, especially come tournament time, this year ten players average over 10 minutes per game.
Jared Harper scored 17 and Auburn needed every one of them in their 79-78 win over New Mexico State; they needed some help from the Aggies, too, missing free throws at the end that could have won or tied the game. Brown had 25 as they cruised to beat Kansas 89-75. Auburn stayed with UNC for the first half and pulled away on a barrage of threes to win 97-80 as Chuma Okeke led with 20 points and 11 rebounds—even after being hurt midway through the 2nd half. Playing without him, the Tigers stayed close to Kentucky all the way into overtime then took over in the extra period, winning 77-71. Harper had 26 including a critical 11 of 11 from the line.
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Game Analysis: Virginia needed a miracle to get past Purdue and make it to the Final Four, which coach Tony Bennett admits has been their target for redemption for last year's first round upset loss. Finally the Cavaliers have followed a great regular season with a great NCAA tournament run. Now the question becomes: with their goal accomplished, do they lose a bit of their fire?
Auburn has had fire all along and you can only expect it will continue. With the loss of key teammate Chuma Okeke the team is hurt schematically but oddly, perhaps helped in terms of motivation. It's hard to quantify the tradeoff there.
This is another game Virginia could win with offense. Auburn's offense is good enough to give the Cavs' D trouble, but the Tiger defense is porous sometimes, and the Cavaliers should capitalize. They shoot and rebound well while the Tiger defense has trouble defending in those areas, and Virginia doesn't give up many turnovers (though they are somewhat vulnerable to steals, where Auburn's D is #1).
Auburn's path to victory is much the same as it has been all along: enthusiam and making 3-point shots. So far in the tournament Auburn has shot 39, 43, 46, and 30% of its 3-pointers. That last number, against Kentucky, would appear to have spelled doom—if the Wildcats hadn't shot just 24% of 3's themselves, along with just 57% from the free thrown line. Sometimes you need a little help from the other guys.
Vegas Line:
Virginia by 5
Power rating: spread
Virginia by 5.4
Game-comparisons: % Chance to win
Virginia: 63.9%
Auburn: 36.1%
The Vegas line almost exactly matches our estimate from the Strength power rating; the resultant percentage to win is not even close to the historical odds. 1-seed have defeated 5-seeds 100% of the time in the Final Four, and 83% of the time in the Elite Eight. In all, 5-seeds have won just 7 in 38 attempts or 18%. At least, that was until this year where 5-seed Auburn beat 1-seed North Carolina, changing those odds to 8 in 39 or 20.5%.
Bottom line: Virginia proved their point—they can have a great post-season. But Auburn is on a once-in-a-lifetime roll and it looks like it will somehow continue all the way to the championship game.
Final prediction: Auburn 72, Virginia 60
More previews: click here for the full 2019 NCAA tournament schedule.
What a prediction after all your stats say otherwise! Just goes to show that even people who know how to use stats can still build a bridge that will kill you. I've just got a hunch the specs on this concrete are different than what we measured. I'm going with my hunch!
Posted by: Matt Gilliam | April 03, 2019 at 04:37 AM
Hi Matt...If March Madness were ruled by stats then all the 1-seeds would be in the Final Four. Unlike building a bridge, there is no certain way to predict a game correctly.
The stats say it's more likely Virginia will win, but in a given game, anything can happen. I chose one specific outcome from the many possibilities based on the stats and my own particular view of the intangibles. On the intangibles YMMV, which is why prior to making a prediction, I present "just the facts" including Vegas and power rating odds.
If I had just used the stats I never would have predicted Auburn would make it to the Final Four. The stats say they should have lost to North Carolina or Kentucky..but in those particular instances, they didn't.
I also had Virginia in the Final Four...so sometimes I do just listen to the stats!
Posted by: SportsRatings | April 03, 2019 at 11:03 PM